The Importance of Online Authority

There is an aspect when it comes to personal branding that quite often is underestimated by the ones who would like to strengthen their online presence: the built of an authoritative voice in their job fields.

Now, in whatever field you work, and you want to rise, you have competitors. They have the same degree you have — or an equivalent one — they have a career — path that isn’t that much different from yours, and the skill sets between you and them is equal. Does this make you all the same? Not at all. The questions that guide you in building your Personal Brand are:

• What is unique about me?
• What is unique about my job?
• What’s the unique content I can offer to my pool of potential customers or users?

Building your own voice to stand up in a pool of qualified professionals, working on your personal branding, is an essential step to take to planning a successful, long-lasting career. Personal branding is nothing else than building a marketing campaign that focuses on you — and your skills. Establishing yourself as a strong voice in a field means that you’ll be able to present yourself to the market, other professionals, customers, and so on, shining for something unmatched you can offer.
Let’s study a quick example: Steve Jobs. If Bill Gates is the man we must thank for spreading technology outside the borders of a very tech-savvy world, Jobs is the man we should thank — or at least recognise — as the one who created the expectation towards the next digital gadget. Where Gates has customers, Jobs cultivated disciples. Especially at the beginning of the Apple Era, having one of their products wasn’t cool just because everyone fancies a particular tech product. Jobs had the power to make you wanted to be the owner of [insert here the name of whatever product you admired in their stores before they had the idea to remove the jack for the headphones] because it offered you the best: the best responsive touch screen, the best camera, the first apps. He made the Apple brand growing, offering the latest technology to people who didn’t know they would have wanted it in their lives. We all thought we could live without a camera on our phone. We still can. But would we? Steve Jobs’ presence was a fine example of personal brand itself: he changed the presentations into a show, he abandoned ties and suits for turtlenecks and blue jeans. You could recognise him by his clothes only, with the same easiness you could and can recognise a product from his company even before then seeing the famous apple.
So, if you’re still asking yourself how and if you need to work on your personal brand to benefit your career, I hope Steve Jobs example is the answer you’re searching for.

But how should you proceed to develop your role as an influential voice?

Focus on the Content you want to promote: I know many of us are good in different works and have quite a set of skills. However, you want to promote yourself in a particular field. Therefore, you need to focus on making high-quality content — or make your digital marketing team do so. Be passionate, be brave, don’t try to offer a common type of content, but always hunts for new ideas, new posts, and even more critical be constant. Your presence can’t be a casual bunch of posts, but it requires a continuous effort to build interest in your targeted audience.

Be Online: it could seem a bit obvious, but there is a significant market share that thinks that having a well — built website or a strong presence on a couple of social channels is enough. It isn’t. First of all, what happens if your site got hacked or your Twitter account is closed? How your audience or potential customers or voters can reach for you? Second, you know what type of target you want to appeal (i.e. people interested in the problem of climate change), but you also know they are users of different platforms. Managing multiple channels give you the occasion to have an interaction with more people.

Give your followers a reason to follow you: I’m sorry to break you this news, but you’re not the only one who wants to gain popularity and, especially, you’re not the only one wishing to charm a specific audience. What can help you to be The One, though, is offering valued content to your users. This content must be aligned with that part of your business that connects with their interests. You can dialogue with your audience, you can teach them tips and tricks about your business, you can ask them what aspects are more interesting for them. Offer them a great reason to return and visit your social channels: a guest they would like you to interview, the explanation of something is happening in your field… the possibilities are countless.

Don’t be shy, be you: customers and followers don’t want to interact with a cold brand. They want to know you. Who are you? What’s your story? I’m not saying you should post photos of you drinking champagne in your Jacuzzi — unless you want to sell either alcohol or expensive bathtubs — but if you’re doing this personal branding work right they want to know your opinions. Users love interacting, have their questions answered, and have a way to see the person behind the name. Again, returning to the Steve Job example, he was a genius who gave you the impression to be on us, a guy in blue jeans you could talk with while drinking coffee, not the man who was revolutionising the tech market.

Having a Personal Brand means having an Added Value: let’s imagine Person A inviting you to their conference about something important for your work. You check their online presence, you find well — created social channels pages, an influential audience in terms of numbers, generally good reviews about this person skills. You can safely establish this person is someone you’re interested in listening to. Now, Person B arrives, with a similar invitation. They only have a facebook profile with general information about studies and works. You don’t have much information about their accomplishments or credentials. They seem as capable as anyone else in your field yourself included, so why should you accept the invitation of someone you perceive as your peer? This speech goes in the other way as well: imagine yourself seeing these two people, and you have to decide which one of them you should hire in your company. Which one would you pick? If someone sees that a considerable number of people gave you their trust, they would be more inclined to do the same. And therefore buy from you or hire you.

As you can see, being perceived as The One opens you to new opportunities. However, all of this isn’t obtainable easily — just look around, how many brilliant people have almost a silent presence? Online, if your content is not being seen, it doesn’t carry any value. Don’t let your talent be wasted. At Targeto we work with professionals from several industries, elevating their personal branding in order to generate business. Among other services, if you want to establish yourself as a strong presence in your field, come and meet our team. Not sure if we’re The Ones for you? No problem, schedule a free call with our team of experts.